Thursday 23 January 2014

Kindness Mission

 [ kindness mission: heart art by Laly Mille, butterfly art by Ginger Deverell ]

I’m delighted to share my recent kindness mission with you. It began as a shared project with my online creative community, inspired by this, and her, and blossomed into so much more.

My lovely and talented artist friend Laly Mille and I collaborated. She’s in France. I’m in Canada. We sent each other our art to print, and we both penned kind notes onto them—mine in English, hers in French. This added a truly special layer to the project. We connected and energized each other with our back-and-forth emails throughout the project, and ideas flowed.

[ filling our art notes with inspirational thoughts and quotes ]

We “abandoned” them out into our communities for others to find: dropped them in mailboxes, tucked them into library books, put up take-what-you-need posters on local bulletin boards, and I strung up notes on a small tree where passerby pedestrians couldn’t help but be curious. Frowns and serious faces were replaced with smiles and softness. Secretly watching some of the reactions was heartwarming. And not knowing who would get the rest of the notes and how it would touch their lives was the gold of this project. I hope we have brought a little tenderness, hope, love and connection to a few people who need it most.

[ decorating my love notes tree ] 

[ hiding secret bookmark notes at the library ]


 [ putting take what you need posters up around the community - this fun idea was inspired by this post by kelly Rae Roberts ]


When my four year-old son asked me what I was working on I did my best to explain kindness to him, and particularly the idea of sending kindness out to strangers anonymously. He said “oh I get it, you’re trying to make people feel happy and loved.” That did it. He was in. We crafted some more notes together and together we snuck them into mailboxes. We invited friends along and quickly we became a troupe. They coasted along streets on their bikes, vying for the position of choosing a note and delivering it. Our spirits were high and our hearts were full.

[ a peek at the junior kindness deliveries, so fun ]

It got me thinking about what I want my son to experience in his education (something often on my mind these days). How I want him to have opportunities to learn through real life experiences. Conversations about intentional learning and values are abundant in our household. What could be more important than for a young mind and heart to learn the importance of giving, being kind, thinking of someone else. And doing it in an organic creative way, with care. It affirms what I already know – I’m committed to walking with our son on his learning journey and building creative ways for his education to unfold. The result? He soars.

One final spark of kindness: Laly and I are sharing our take what you need kindness posters as free downloads. Grab my poster here in English and French, and get Laly's on her blog. Print them out, hang them on your fridge, post them on bulletin boards around your own community. Keep the kindness flowing! And if you do, come back and leave us a note in the comments!

The other half of this mission lives on Laly's blog. Make sure you head over to read it, and to get her free kindness poster!  

Thank you kindness mission. You opened my heart (our hearts).



This post is part of our monthly Flying Lessons Blog Circle. Click through to Laly Mille’s blog to see her experience of our shared kindness mission! And then continue on to the next kindness project in the circle by visiting the link she shares at the end of her post. Here is the full group:
Ginger Deverell, Canada (You Are Here)
Laly Mille, France
Sandy King
Naz Laila, Australia
Kristen Fairgrieve
Lulu Bea (Alaina McGinley)
Karrlin Bain, USA
Kathie Gadd
Chandra Merod
Lisa Ullrich

And visit Kelly Rae Roberts website to gather fabulous kindness mission ideas.

 

15 comments:

  1. Yay, I get to be the first to say this was SOOO great Ginger. Fun to collaborate with Laly. Love global connections. Great pictures of your process too . And really great to involve your son. What a wonderful life lesson. Didn't it just make you feel like there was kindness growing inside as this mission evolved ? I had so much fun doing it. And so random that I ended up doing something similar to you and Laly without knowing. Well done ... Big hug. XX off to the next stop

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    1. Thanks Sandy! Yes exactly, it's as though kindness grows the more you give. It's great that our missions ended up being so similar - loved the whole experience! Glad I got to share it with this lovely group of gals. x

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  2. Beautiful! I love how you decorated the tree and how your son got involved :)

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  3. Ginger, I love what you and Laly chose to do for your kindness mission. Wonderful ideas and love that you got your son involved. So special to share that with him. Great photos too! :)

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    1. Hi Lisa, Thanks :) It was truly so much fun and meaningful on many levels. x

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  4. Wow. You inspire me. :-)

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    1. Awww, thanks robin :-) We make a great group don't we!

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  5. Awesome!… a collaborative kindness circle… love this. Beautiful work. Thank You :-)

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    1. Thanks for popping by and leaving a note Lisa. It's amazing to see all the kindness missions people are doing out in the world, and nice to be a small part of it :)

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  6. Hey Ginger! The Moonpaper Tent is always creating magic for the public world...recently we put a mailbox in our garden for passers-by to interact with the Moon-Fairies. We would love to collaborate on a Kindness Mission project! email me! sylvanfairy@moonpapertent.org xxoo

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  7. OMG...I love this! So great to find out what you've been up to....you sleuthy, kindness elf, you! Warms my heart...and am really hoping to find one of your notes out there somewhere!

    ps: you got fingerless gloves! They're awesome! I want to know where you ended up finding them?

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    1. Haha, thanks Melissa! Maybe we'll share a kindness mission sometime, yeah? Yep I got my wrist warmers on Saltspring Island, they were made by a local knitter. Still say it would be fun to have a Melissa creation though, crocheted :-) xox

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  8. What a beautiful mission. So inspired by your wonderful words and beautiful arts. Great work Ginger.

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